Since the beginning of modern civilization, parents of infants have sought a solution to the time consuming and often messy proposition of disposing of soiled diapers.
The first diapers utilized by parents included cloth diapers, normally made of cotton, that had to be cleaned, washed and pressed for reuse. Needless to say this was a very inefficient and displeasurable task.
In the early 1960's disposable diapers made of an absorbant material were introduced into the market place. While these early disposable diapers alleviated some of the problems associated with cloth diapers, they required the use of waterproof panties to prevent moisture from soaking through to the outside.
In the 1970's improvements in disposable diapers revolutionized the diapering of infants. As the term "disposable" implies, these diapers were designed to be discarded after a single use. Such disposable diapers generally consisted of an absorbant pad, a liquid Permeable top sheet covering the pad and a liquid impervious back sheet for containing the liquid waste within the absorbant pad.
Not all disposable diapers, however, included all of the above features. For example some disposable diapers contained no back sheet and were used in conjunction with a separate pair of liquid impervious pants. Other disposable diapers utilized a variety of pad-like inserts for use with specially designed pants or for application within a conventional cloth diaper. Typical inserts are described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 2,450,059 and 20,023.
In the past few years, however, disposable diapers have been further improved. These improved disposable diapers normally have better absorption and water retention properties than the earlier disposable diapers. Such diapers are described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,685,916 and 4,695,278.
In eliminating many of the problems associated with earlier diapers, however, the improved disposable diapers have created new problems of their own. In particular such diapers have caused serious environmental and sanitary hazards. Such disposable diapers have created the environmentally unsafe practice of disposing of the plastic back sheet material in landfills. Such plastic materials have a biodegradable life of approximately five hundred (500) years. With the ever increasing use of landfills to contain today's ever growing volume of garbage it is both environmentally unsafe and practically unreasonable to store such materials for a five hundred (500) year time period.
A more pressing problem than the environmental landfill nightmare, however, is the unsanitary health conditions caused by the disposal of fecally soiled diapers in the landfills. Due to the nature of today's disposable diapers many, if not most, adults dispose of soiled diapers by merely tossing them in the household garbage. From there they are transported to the municipal landfill and disposed of without any treatment whatsoever. Thus, untreated fecal waste accumulates every day by the ton in municipal landfills causing a serious health hazard.
In contrast, however, the present invention provides for a disposable diaper with a separable inner sheet for flushing in a toilet or water closet where it will be transported to a treatment facility. The remaining portion of the diaper is made of biodegradable materials for landfill disposal.
The present invention, therefore, allows the fecally contaminated inner sheet of the diaper to be treated at a conventional wastewater treatment facility while at the same time providing for the disposal of the remaining diaper portion at a normal landfill. Moreover, the present invention is easy to use, convenient and effective.
Thus, the present invention provides numerous advantages over prior disposable diapers and eliminates many of the environmental and health hazards therein.